The best things in life are free! But, alas, the Press is not.

After yesterday's posting I was in some random chatroom and got into a bit of a barney with some guy from the US. I tell you this not because me having an ether-scrap is unusual but because it kind of follows directly on from what I was saying in that last post.

I was having a reasonably pleasant game of poker online (in a non-money situation... I'm way too crap to actually bet!) and just talking bollocks with my fellow players when one did the usual boring "age / sex / location" thing, a sure sign of someone with nothing interesting to actually start a conversation with. Feeling in a generous mood I obliged, and although I told him that I was 73 days old and asexual I actually opted for truth on the third question. And his response? Well, aside from not batting an eyelid at the first two answers he responded to my location being Sinless City by saying "Oh, all the press there is Government controlled isn't it".

He was right of course, but my initial response was one of mild indignation. "The press here?", I replied. "Have you watched Fox News recently?". Cue lots of patriotic flag waving and general fucking hysteria from not just that one guy but half the bloody table. But during the course of the argument I found myself getting wound up less by the ignorami and more by the fact that I could not think of any news organisation which is truly trustworthy.

When I used to live on the Rainy Isle I rarely bothered with newspapers, except for doing the odd crossword or sudoku. I used to get one middle-class right-wing tabloid rag from time to time, just so I could vent my spleen at the suppresive shit written by the bigotted cunts, but if I wanted news I always took to Auntie Beeb.... okay, still not completely independent and influence free, but at least you got the feeling that they tried - or at least you did until Blair's spin machine castrated them after the David Kelly suicide.

The truth of the matter is that whatever you want to know about, whatever shit is going on out there, you have to find it out for yourself. Don't just swallow the pill that the propoganda machine feeds you... the media outlets are all, without exception, owned by companies and individuals with a vested interest in not telling you the exact truth. And the bitter side of that is it includes publications and programming that you or I may personally agree with most of the time. It is too easy for us to buy the newspaper that suits our own politics and nod in agreement with what it has to say, but it is of far more value to complement that with something that spouts a rival opinion. At least it can make you think, force you to defend what you believe in.

And of course we can now find out what goes on through the wider outlet of the net. As Brewski has said in his blog, we need to unlearn - remove what we have been told is true and explore to find our own truths. When we were about 13 if we had to write an essay we would probably get quotes exhaustively from one or two books. Would you do the same writing as an adult? If you did you'd probably not do very well. Put the feelers out - digest it all, evaluate it all. Hell, I may still disagree with your opinion at the end of it all, but at least it is yours and not that of Rupert Murdoch and his ilk.....

The fucker beat me at poker too.....

Oh, and incidentally... the poker hand above was, unfortunately, not mine. Ye gads, no! (sob)

Cheers m'dears!